


home is a word (a strong one)

by callunavulgari



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: F/F, Pack, Resurrection, Scenting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-07
Updated: 2014-02-07
Packaged: 2018-01-11 11:29:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,507
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1172530
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/callunavulgari/pseuds/callunavulgari
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Want me to paint your toenails?” This wasn’t what Lydia was expecting when she brought Derek’s dead sister back to life, but she sure isn’t complaining.</p>
            </blockquote>





	home is a word (a strong one)

**Author's Note:**

> I’m using [this](http://femslash100.livejournal.com/543986.html) prompt table. Today’s prompt: The Magician. God, I love rare pairs.

She isn’t overly fond of the Hales. Hasn’t been since she first learned that it was actually the dream-hopping zombie werewolf psychopath that bit her in sophomore year. As far as she’s concerned, the Hales can all drop dead. And no, she does not give a crap how bad that thought was, considering that most of them have, in fact, dropped dead.

But she figures, she did it once. How hard would it be to do a second time, when there’s not a dead werewolf haunting her brain?

.

The answer is: hard. Very hard. But she’s Lydia Martin and as far as she’s concerned, that means she can do anything.

.

There’s less decomposition than she would have thought, considering that the body she’s trying to resurrect has been dead for quite awhile. It’s still disgusting, crouched down in the dirt, sewing a corpse back together.

When everything is ready, she takes a vial of Derek’s blood and watches it spatter on cold, dead skin. She’s watching this time, her mind cold and clinical as the flesh bleeds from gray to pink, as all the rot knits itself up nice and neat. She blinks and Laura Hale gasps awake, her eyes a reassuring blood red.

It takes a minute for Laura to catch her breath, her chest heaving. It’s cold enough outside that Laura’s nipples pull tight within seconds, her breath coming in huge puffs of white fog. There’s a spare jacket set aside just for this purpose, an old ratty thing that hasn’t been trendy for years, so Lydia doesn’t feel like she’s ruining perfectly good clothes by passing it over to a body that’s been dead for years.

Laura’s eyes focus on her when she feels the fabric on her skin and for a time, all she does is stare at Lydia blankly. Then, she takes the coat, nods gratefully, and shrugs it around her shoulders.

It’s a tight fit—Lydia hasn’t worn it since she was thirteen and Laura Hale was in her twenties when she died, but she’s at least able to yank it over her breasts.

"Thank you," she tells Lydia, her voice hoarse and creaking. It sounds as if there’s spider webs in her throat. Lydia’s hoping that isn’t the case.

"You died," Lydia tells her flatly. If Allison were here, she would probably elbow her until she apologized, but Allison isn’t, because Allison has more important things to worry about than dead Hales.

The frown that pulls at Laura’s brows is so confused that it’s almost cute, but it doesn’t take her long to rearrange her face into something a bit more composed. “I remember,” she whispers. “Peter, he…”

"Is a giant asshole?" Lydia finishes sweetly, tossing her hair over her shoulder. "Yeah, I know."

Laura blinks, the alpha red finally fading from her eyes. They’re green, almost the same shade as Derek’s.

"Tell me what happened," Laura demands, her voice like steel. Lydia smiles and tells her.

.

"I saw you once," Lydia tells her later, after Laura’s taken a much needed shower and curled up beside Lydia’s bed in a pair of her pajamas. It’s one of her more comfortable pairs and they’re a bit short, but Laura seems to like them well enough.

"Once upon a dream," Lydia sing-songs, smirking when Laura seems to brighten up at the reference. The smirk fades when she recalls exactly what Laura Hale was doing in Peter’s fucked up dream. "You were screaming."

Laura looks at her carefully as Lydia sets a cup of steaming tea beside her. At first, she doesn’t think that Laura will touch it, but after a moment, she takes a small sip and lets out a pleased sound.

They sit in silence for awhile, Lydia catching up on some of the homework she’d gotten behind on and Laura apparently soaking in the fact that she’s actually _alive_.

"So, if I’m the alpha again…" Laura starts, setting aside the empty mug. Lydia winces, realizing that her explanation might have fallen slightly short.

"Derek gave it up to save Cora," she explains quickly. "He didn’t talk about it much before he left and hasn’t since he came back. I hadn’t given it much thought since McCall is suddenly a ‘true’ alpha or whatever."

She sighs. Werewolf politics. “I don’t know why you came back as the alpha. When… Peter came back, it didn’t happen to him.” She knows this for a fact. She was there, she’d seen his eyes glow blue.

Laura cocks her head curiously, long brown hair sliding over her shoulder. She hadn’t brushed it, when she’d gotten out of the shower, but it’s still drying glossy. It’s distracting. “What are you?” Laura asks her.

"A banshee, apparently," she snorts. Then, when it seems like Laura’s going to ask, "Don’t ask me, I’m still waiting for the same answer."

"Oh," is all Laura says, nodding. "May I have some more tea?"

.

She doesn’t know why Laura ends up camping out in her bedroom for the next two weeks. She’d asked and Lydia, perplexed, had said that it was all right. So every day, she comes home from school to the sight of an alpha werewolf curled up in her bed with the _Land Before Time_ playing on her laptop or pacing the perimeter of the room, a worn copy of _Pride and Prejudice_ under her nose. It’s strange, but Lydia doesn’t mind it.

She doesn’t really make the connection, but the first time she comes home smelling like Aiden is the first time that Laura nuzzles her, laughing as she rubs her head against Lydia’s jaw like… well, like a wolf.

"Why haven’t you gone to see Derek yet?" Lydia asks her one day. Laura’s fresh out of the shower, humming some top 40s song that had been playing on Lydia’s Ipod, all but dancing around the room. She stops, though, wincing. A moment later, she drops onto the end of the bed, her hand brushing up against Lydia’s toes.

"Would you believe me if I said I was nervous?" she asks, somewhat ruefully.

"Yes," Lydia shrugs. "Sooner or later though, someone’s going to smell you on me. McCall’s already giving me weird looks." Aiden’s doing more than that, but so far she’s done a decent job at avoiding him.

"I know," Laura says, sighing.

.

"Want me to paint your toenails?"

This wasn’t what Lydia was expecting when she brought Derek’s dead sister back to life, but she sure isn’t complaining.

.

Lydia’s smart. She damn well knows that, even if she chooses to hide it behind Gucci bags and expensive perfume, but it’s _her_ choice. If she wants the entire town to think she’s a dumb bimbo, they’re damn well going to think she’s the dumbest bimbo around. But she knows her brain better than anyone and even if she didn’t know how high her IQ is, she’d be well aware of the fact that she’s a genius.

Yet somehow, after a month and a half of Laura sharing her bed, she’s still surprised when the woman kisses her.

It’s chaste enough that if she wanted, she could laugh it off. Lydia’s used to the feel of Laura’s breath against her pulse by now, so when Laura had come to her this time, all playful nuzzles and warm, laughing girl lips, Lydia hadn’t blinked. She’d just combed her fingers absentmindedly through Laura’s hair and returned the touch. She wasn’t half so used to the feel of Laura’s lips moving to catch hers, brushing them so gently that she could pull away. If she wanted to.

Laura’s eyes are open, watching her carefully to see how she’ll proceed. Lydia could do any number of things, but instead, something in her brain lets out a soft, pleased, _oh,_ and she opens her mouth to kiss back.

.

In the end, it’s not Laura’s smell on her that clues the others in, it’s the way she comes charging into a clearing of witches intent on sacrificing Lydia to whatever as the rest of the Beacon Hills pack watches, jaws agape.

It isn’t until she’s gotten Lydia untied and is carefully lifting her down from the branches of yew she’d been strapped to for the last hour that anyone speaks.

"Man, you look so much better now that you’re not in two pieces," Stiles blurts and it’s so like him that Lydia just rolls her eyes. Laura’s eyes are still alpha red and there’s a tension in her shoulders that gives Lydia the impression that she knows fully well that her brother is standing right behind her, his eyes so open _, so raw_ with emotion that it actively hurts to look at him, so Lydia just smiles and presses a kiss to her cheek.

Gently, she turns Laura around, smiling softly when both Hales let out wounded noises and rush together, catching and holding, like they’re magnetized together.

.

Later, Laura will kiss her happily and say, “We’re still going to kill Peter though, right?”

"Duh," Lydia will snort, and kiss her right back.


End file.
